Bring Your Own Cup - SVYCA's Zero Waste Initiative

Silicon Valley Youth Climate Action is building a reuse culture - One cup. One habit. One movement!

BYOC is a youth-led campaign (14-22) encouraging customers to bring reusable cups to participating coffee and boba shops across the Bay Area. By bringing together residents, local businesses, community organizations, and elected officials, we are working to make reuse easier and reduce single-use waste—one drink at a time.

Youth volunteers can contribute remotely through flexible, asynchronous work and are asked to commit approximately 1–2 hours per week. Sign up here

This is about more than cups. We are working to make bringing your own cup feel like a normal daily habit—not a niche environmental activity. Every day, we grab a coffee, boba, tea, or other drink. We enjoy it for a few minutes—and then the cup, lid, straw, and other packaging can become waste.

BYOC (Bring Your Own Cup) is a game changer.

Across the Bay Area, communities are now making reusable cups part of everyday life. In San Francisco, the BYOC effort has already engaged over 100 businesses, with the city working toward tracking 100,000+ single-use cups avoided each year through reuse.